Two Incomprehensibles
You may assume life of some kind omnipresent for ever throughout matter. This is one way. Another way is to assume an act of spontaneous generation, i.e. a transition somewhere and somewhen from absolutely non-living to absolutely living. You cannot have it both ways. But it seems to me that you must have it both ways. You must not begin with life (or potential life) everywhere alone, nor must you begin with a single spontaneous generation alone, but you must carry your spontaneous generation (or denial of the continuity of life) down, ad infinitum, just as you must carry your continuity of life (or denial of spontaneous generation) down ad infinitum and, compatible or incompatible, you must write a scientific Athanasian Creed to comprehend these two incomprehensibles.
If, then, it is only an escape from one incomprehensible position to another, cui bono to make a change? Why not stay quietly in the Athanasian Creed as we are? And, after all, the Athanasian Creed is light and comprehensible reading in comparison with much that now passes for science.
I can give no answer to this as regards the unintelligible clauses, for what we come to in the end is just as abhorrent to and inconceivable by reason as what they offer us; but as regards what may be called the intelligible parts—that Christ was born of a Virgin, died, rose from the dead—we say that, if it were not for the prestige that belief in these alleged facts has obtained, we should refuse attention to them. Out of respect, however, for the mass of opinion that accepts them we have looked into the matter with care, and we have found the evidence break down. The same reasoning and canons of criticism which convince me that Christ was crucified convince me at the same time that he was insufficiently crucified. I can only accept his death and resurrection at the cost of rejecting everything that I have been taught to hold most strongly. I can only accept the so-called testimony in support of these alleged facts at the cost of rejecting, or at any rate invalidating, all the testimony on which I have based all comfortable assurance of any kind whatsoever.